Psychological Barriers

There is a ramp leading from the parking lot to my office.  I have permission to park my motorcycle in a non-used, covered entry way to the building, so each day I putter up the ramp to park ... some days puttering better than others.

As you can see from the picture, the sidewalk is five feet wide, with a retaining wall between the ramp and the building and when  I traverse the ramp I face a wall in front of me, and either to the left or right of me. Therein lay the problem.

I love to train with motorcycles so have taken many, many classes on maneuvering my big VN 1600 (750 lbs.) in small spaces.  On a training range I can easily make either a right or left hand turn in dimensions far less than described above and curiously coming down the ramp each afternoon I have no problem with the smooth and easy turn.  But riding up that friggin' ramp each morning I am batting about .500; either I make the turn easily and smoothly or I fixate on the wall and stop or put my feet down.  Every now and then I just bounce off the wall, scraping it with my foot pegs.

And the difference is all in my head.

While living in Arizona I had several training opportunities with the Arizona Precision Drill Team, a bunch of hard core riders (men & women) whose favorite rig is a big Honda Goldwing.  They successfully compete all over the country in precision riding and have the trophy's to affirm their skill.  These are among the best of the best when it comes to handling big, bulky motorcycles.  After one particularly arduous training session with them, during which most of us either dumped our bikes or massacred more than a few cones, the instructor told us a story:

All of the folks on the Team can easily turn their bikes in a circle of less than 20 feet diameter and doing it on the range was no longer a challenge for them.  One of the members has a driveway, twenty feet in diameter, with  walls on both sides and of course the garage doors in front.  So one day the Team met at his house, chatted a bit, and set out to practice tight turns in the driveway as a new challenge.

Not one of them was successful!

Remember, these are experts at maneuvering big bikes in tight spaces at slow speed; they can easily turn those monsters in under twenty feet on the range, but not one could do so in a twenty foot driveway surrounded by walls.

The difference was all in their heads.

Thank God - it's not just me, but all us humans who have psychological barriers that prevent us from doing what we know we can do!  I wonder in what other endeavors I limit myself not by skill or ability, but my head?  And what does it take to get out of my head and trust my skill, to move beyond the psychological barrier that prevents me from achieving success?

I'll keep pondering and I'll keep tackling that doggone ramp, and one day, one glorious day, I will allow my skill to triumph over the limitations of my head!

Love & Hate on a Cold Winter's Day

My mother was born in 1913 and this year would be her 100th anniversary.  She was also part of the civilian group that built the AlCan Highway during the early years of World War II.  I saw pictures of mom during that time - a young woman, married to her true love and doing something of importance - and whenever she spoke of that time, her face would reflect the joy and excitement of that period of her life.

So to honor my mother and satisfy my own need for road time, I am planning to ride the AlCan Highway from Dawson Creek to Fairbanks, AK and then on up to the Arctic Circle, in May.  Riding the Alcan today is not the harrowing adventure it once was, but thoughtful planning is still required if one plans to make the ride on a motorcycle.  And since it is in my nature to think and plan ahead, thus extending the enjoyment of any trip far beyond the actual time on the road, I have been thinking, planning, and working towards my AlCan Adventure.

A big part of the thinking, planning and working involves preparation of the motorcycle.  Last year I bought a Triumph Tiger 800 which, although it has pretensions of an adventure bike is really a roadie with a slight attitude, and more than sufficient for my purposes.  I am adding bits to make the bike more practical for the AlCan journey and said bits include items such as the motorcycle equivalent of mudflaps, a radiator guard, and panniers.  Since the Tiger is chain driven and cleaning and lubing of said chain is vital for optimal performance, it was necessary for me to install a center stand which does not come standard on the Tiger Roadie, and therein lay a tale.

Given that the weather is crap up here in the Pacific Northwest I have had ample opportunity to peruse the internet and various forums in search of the best center stand for my bike.  Seeking a balance between efficacy and economics, I decided to go with the OEM model which met the criteria of working effectively without breaking the bank.  As explained before given my tendancy towards thinking and planning I had read the instructions numerous times, consulted the Tiger forum pages for advice, and even found a well-done how-to video on Youtube; so having picked up the parts from my local Triumph dealer and with all the proper tools and parts set out in front of me, I began the task.

And learned that nobody tells the whole damn truth.  Phrases such as "this is a bit dodgy" or "the tolerances are pretty close" come nowhere near describing the gymnastics required to turn one lousy screw ten times.

Disconnecting old parts and placing new parts took about ten minutes; that was followed by thirty minutes of using every tool I possess along with contortions of my body that I never thought possible just trying to tighten that one friggin' screw.  Having exhausted my full lexicon of slurs for the British, I finally surrendered and set out to appropriate a tool which might work to tighten the new parts into place.  This involved trips to two different auto parts stores thus consuming an hour of my rapidly waning life span, followed by another hour getting my mouth set just right as I endeavored to get on or the other tool into place such that I could actually use it to tighten that one miserable, stinking, cursed to hell screw.  The end result was a definite love-hate relationship with Triumph engineers.

Parenthetically let me note that when I was seeking the correct tool the fellow at the parts store said that he hoped I was at least working in a heated garage, to which I replied that my invective had certainly raised the temperature a bit.  He advised that should I run out of blue language to please call, as he and his mates had plenty of additions to offer.  Seems they had all worked on Brit bikes as well.

Modern engineering truly is a marvel; the tight tolerances allow for magnificanet machines that are sleek and capable.  But at the same time those tolerances make it nigh impossible for the average week-end warrior such as myself to work on the bike because getting to one part often involves dis-assembling the whole bloody thing.  But perhaps that is the moral of the story; to change one part of life usally involves adjustment or dis-assembly of many other parts as well.

Just make sure you have the right friggin' tools at hand ...